Cusick’s vision shaped Boston hockey

ORLANDO, FL – For 45 years, he sat behind a microphone at the old Boston Garden and arenas around the NHL describing the fortunes of the Boston Bruins on radio and television. His was the voice of two Stanley Cup championships and the one that introduced New England hockey fans to a kid from Parry Sound, Ontario named Bobby Orr. Fred Cusick, the man who was responsible for helping teach a generation of

fans the game of hockey while making names from John Adams to Rich Zombo  heroes in black and gold, lost a battle with cancer last week at the age of 90. His death, on the eve of his induction into the Massachusetts Broadcasters Hall of Fame, came as a shock to both the team he faithfully served and the fans who thought of him like a member of the family. “What he was, he was a Bruin. He was absolutely an admired, respected and beloved member of the Bruins family for many years,” Bruins senior advisor to the owner and former coach, president and general manager Harry Sinden said in a team release. “He is a huge, huge part of Bruins history. There‘s no doubt of the impact he had on the broadcasting of hockey.” Growing up in the mid to late 1960’s like I did, I never had the pleasure of hearing Cusick on the radio. In fact, Cusick’s career with the Bruins began in 1952 when he replaced Frank Ryan as the team‘s “voice“. His college playing days at Northeastern University (by the way, he also played football and baseball for the Huskies) and covering the Boston Olympics for WVOM radio in Brookline stood him in good stead while working with former Bruin Jack Crawford on the broadcasts over WHDH-AM. He was also the sports director at WEEI radio as well. His love of the game and the Bruins turned out to be the prime forces that brought the B’s into living rooms across the region. During the 1963-1964 season, he personally edited game tapes from Saturday nights and drove copies to WMUR-TV in Manchester, New Hampshire and later WHDH-TV (now WCVB-TV) in Boston. It was no small accomplishment that Cusick’s persistence won out because at the time the Bruins were basement dwellers in the six team NHL. His efforts led to live coverage of games just as Orr burst on the scene and almost single-handedly turned the fortunes of the franchise around. I came to know of Cusick when he followed Don Earle as play-by-play announcer on WSBK-TV 38 in 1971. He brought his radio style – descriptive and narrative but simple and understandable – to viewers who could now put his words with pictures. Matched up with former Bruins winger John Peirson, the pair were able to accentuate every high point and teach with every low point that unfolded. When the Bruins played well, he said so and when they didn’t he wasn’t afraid to say so. “That voice is unmistakable, full and husky, like a tenor saxophone. At some moments it is smooth and at others – when play nears the goal for instance – it is gritty,” Sports Illustrated writer Stu Hackel wrote in a 1994 story about Cusick. “Each word is distinct. Listeners hear the final k in Kirk before the M in Muller. When the action is rough, Cusick gives each word a special punch. In moments of excitement he sustains the tension by elongating vowels.” Cusick’s use of the word “score” followed by the name of the Bruin who lit the lamp became his signature call and music to the ears of fans. The viewers connected with him and in turn he with them. His iconic status with the fans was never more evident than on the evening in September of 1995 when the old Garden hosted its last hockey game. During an intermission, the organization honored several people who had been a part of the team’s history. The ovation for Cusick was thunderous and long, rivaling the applause received by many of the former players who attended the night’s festivities including Derek Sanderson, John Bucyk, Phil Esposito and Orr. “Broadcasting from the Boston Garden for 1,500 games surrounded by the passionate Boston fans made my job easy,” Cusick told the Boston Globe in an email interview two weeks before his death. “I never felt like I was working. I had the greatest job in the world and the best seat in the house.” (Having called a state high school basketball semifinal game from the very balcony overhang where Cusick sat for all those games, I can say that he was right about it being the best seat in the building.) Those of us who grew up with Fred Cusick on TV-38 and later NESN (New England Sports Network) knew him as a hockey guy. There was however so much more to him than just bleeding black and gold. Until recently, I never knew that during World War II, Cusick was a Navy man and commanded a sub chaser and stayed in the Naval Reserves until 1946. His work with the Bruins earned Cusick the honor of being selected by CBS-TV to be the play-by-play man for the very first U.S. network hockey broadcast in January of 1957 and eventually spent four seasons calling the Eye network’s “NHL Game of the Week” telecasts. It was his work at WEEI that led me to another interesting fact. Cusick was on the radio team that called the very first game played by the then-new American Football League on September 9, 1960. It came on a Friday night at Nickerson Field at Boston University (which for you non-Boston sports buffs was the original site of the Huntington Avenue Grounds that was home to baseball’s Boston Braves) between the Denver Broncos and the Boston Patriots. His keen sense of history and sport came into play in 1963 when he interviewed Francis Ouimet, the winner of golf’s 1913 U.S. Open in an 18-hole playoff with British pros Jack Ray and Harry Vardon. Ouimet, who was a caddy at the Country Club in Brookline, Mass. when he won that open, sat down with Cusick on the 50th anniversary of his victory for what is the only known video interview he ever did. (If you own a DVD copy of the Disney movie “The Greatest Game Ever Played”, one of the bonus features is that interview with Ouimet in its entirety.) Cusick’s dedication to the game was rewarded in 1984 when he was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame as the Hall honored its first group of media members – the first American announcer to enter the Hall. He was also awarded the Foster Hewitt Memorial Award along with Danny Gallivan, Rene Lecavalier and Foster Hewitt (the award’s namesake) for outstanding contributions to their profession and the game (many of Cusick‘s ideas for camera positions and angles for broadcasts are still used today). Four years later, the NHL bestowed upon him the Lester Patrick Trophy for outstanding service to hockey in the United States. Cusick’s goal was always to call a game as it played out before his eyes and those of the people who hung on his every word. He did that and in the process did as much for the Bruins as the players who laced up the skates, bringing an entire region together on winter nights to cheer for its hockey heroes. It is a legacy that those who follow in his footsteps are well aware of. “Those fortunate enough to inherit the position Fred Cusick created are merely playing on the land he cleared. None of us ever will have the impact he had in generating the fan base for this team, “ current NESN Bruins play-by-play announcer Jack Edwards said. “Fred was passionate and willing to share how much the game thrilled him every night and he drew us in with those qualities. We have lost a great pioneer.” A pioneer, the likes of which we may never see again in our lifetimes. Contact the author at don.money@prohockeynews.com